Gone Away ~ The journal of Clive Allen in America

Spare a Thought for Archy
08/12/2005

There is a saying that "on the internet, no-one knows that you're a dog". Which is true enough and bears hidden philosophical implications to boot, but gives no hint of the problems encountered as a blogging chameleon. It's not easy, I can assure you, even when you have become skillful enough to use all four feet, your tail and tongue to work the keys, as I have.

So I may have had the occasional quiet complaint about my trials and tribulations but, in truth, I know that they are as nothing when compared to the obstacles overcome by others. Perhaps the most famous example was a cockroach who wrote poetry for a journalist, Don Marquis, way back in the 1920s and 30s. This talented and hard-working creature became renowned for his literary style and tales of a cat that he knew; he was, of course, the great Archy of Archy and Mehitabel.

One can imagine the enormous problems encountered by a cockroach attempting to work a typewriter. I am in awe of such an achievement and thank my stars that I was born to an age of touch-sensitive keyboards. In Archy's honor, I can do no better than to quote directly from Don Marquis' first article about him:

We came into our room earlier than usual in the morning, and discovered a gigantic cockroach jumping about upon the keys. He did not see us and we watched him. He would climb painfully upon the framework of the machine and cast himself with all his force upon a key, head downward, and his weight and the impact of the blow were just sufficient to operate the machine, one slow letter after another. He could not work the capital letters, and he had a great deal of difficulty operating the mechanism that shifts the paper so that a fresh line may be started. We never saw a cockroach work so hard or perspire so freely in all our lives before. After about an hour of this frightfully difficult literary labor he fell to the floor exhausted, and we saw him creep feebly into a nest of the poems which are always there in profusion.

Congratulating ourself that we had left a sheet of paper in the machine the night before so that all this work had not been in vain, we made an examination, and this is what we found:

expression is the need of my soul
I was once a vers libre bard
but I died and my soul went into the body of a cockroach
it has given me a new outlook upon life
I see things from the under side now
thank you for the apple peelings in the wastepaper basket
but your paste is getting so stale i cant eat it
there is a cat here at night i wish you would have
removed she nearly ate me the other night why dont she
catch rats that is what she is supposed to be for
there is a rat here she should get without delay
most of these rats here are just rats
but this rat is like me he has a human soul in him
he used to be a poet himself
night after night i have written poetry for you
on your typewriter
and this big brute of a rat who used to be a poet
comes out of his hole when it is done
and reads it and sniffs at it
he is jealous of my poetry
he used to make fun of it when we were both human
he was a punk poet himself
and after he has read it he sneers
and then he eats it
i wish you would have that cat kill that rat
or get a cat that is onto her job
and i will write you a series of poems
showing how things look
to a cockroach
that rats name used to be freddy
the next time freddy dies i hope he wont be a rat
but something smaller i hope i will be the rat
in the next transmigration and freddy the cockroach
i will teach him to sneer at my poetry then
dont you ever eat any sandwiches in your office
i havent had a crumb of bread for i dont know how long
or a piece of ham or anything but apple parings
and paste leave a piece of paper in your machine
every night you can call me archy


What passion and drama are conveyed by those few, simple lines! There are many of us now that the computer has made literacy so much more easily available to all sorts of creatures, but let us take a moment to remember the first and greatest of us all, Archy the cockroach.

And, of course, it is impossible to recall Archy without thoughts of the delightful Mehitabel creeping in. Here is one of Archy's finest works, in which he tells the tale of his feline friend:

The Song of Mehitabel

this is the song of mehitabel
of mehitabel the alley cat
as i wrote you before boss
mehitabel is a believer
in the pythagorean
theory of the transmigration
of the soul and she claims
that formerly her spirit
was incarnated in the body
of cleopatra
that was a long time ago
and one must not be
surprised if mehitabel
has forgotten some of her
more regal manners

i have had my ups and downs
but wotthehell wotthehell
yesterday sceptres and crowns
fried oysters and velvet gowns
and today i herd with bums
but wotthehell wotthehell
i wake the world from sleep
as i caper and sing and leap
when i sing my wild free tune
wotthehell wotthehell
under the blear eyed moon
i am pelted with cast off shoon
but wotthehell wotthehell

do you think that i would change
my present freedom to range
for a castle or moated grange
wotthehell wotthehell
cage me and i d go frantic
my life is so romantic
capricious and corybantic
and i m toujours gai toujours gai

i know that i am bound
for a journey down the sound
in the midst of a refuse mound
but wotthehell wotthehell
oh i should worry and fret
death and i will coquette
there s a dance in the old dame yet
toujours gai toujours gai

i once was an innocent kit
wotthehell wotthehell
with a ribbon my neck to fit
and bells tied onto it
o wotthehell wotthehell
but a maltese cat came by
with a come hither look in his eye
and a song that soared to the sky
and wotthehell wotthehell
and i followed adown the street
the pad of his rhythmical feet
o permit me again to repeat
wotthehell wotthehell

my youth i shall never forget
but there s nothing i really regret
wotthehell wotthehell
there s a dance in the old dame yet
toujours gai toujours gai

the things that i had not ought to
i do because i ve gotto
wotthehell wotthehell
and i end with my favorite motto
toujours gai toujours gai

boss sometimes i think
that our friend mehitabel
is a trifle too gay


Remember that in 1927, when the poem was written, there was only one meaning for the word "gay". I do urge you to visit the link given above and read more of Archy's stuff; he is highly entertaining and relevant even today. But if time proves too pressing, here is another link to just one more of his poems:

Pete the Parrot and Shakespeare.

Technorati tags: ; ; .

Clive

Victor
I can say that I have never heard of Archy the Cockroach, or as Al Pacino in Scarface might pronounce it: "Cock-a-roach". I really enjoyed the following: "I see things from the under side now thank you for the apple peelings in the wastepaper basket but your paste is getting so stale i cant eat it" ...and... "dont you ever eat any sandwiches in your office i havent had a crumb of bread for i dont know how long or a piece of ham or anything but apple parings and paste leave a piece of paper in your machine" Even though the poem is quick, and that we're only talking about a cockroach, you can't help but feel sorry for the fella and his plight. I guess it's the ultimate exercise in anthropomorphism. Good find, Clive. Take care, Vic
Date Added: 09/12/2005

Victor
****let's try this again, with line breaks this time***** I can say that I have never heard of Archy the Cockroach, or as Al Pacino in Scarface might pronounce it: "Cock-a-roach".

I really enjoyed the following:

"I see things from the under side now thank you for the apple peelings in the wastepaper basket but your paste is getting so stale i cant eat it"

...and...

"dont you ever eat any sandwiches in your office i havent had a crumb of bread for i dont know how long or a piece of ham or anything but apple parings and paste leave a piece of paper in your machine"

Even though the poem is quick, and that we're only talking about a cockroach, you can't help but feel sorry for the fella and his plight.

I guess it's the ultimate exercise in anthropomorphism.

Good find, Clive.

Take care,

Vic
Date Added: 09/12/2005

Gone Away
I discovered Archy and Mehitabel as a child, Vic. My mother had a couple of Don Marquis' books - collections of his articles. I was an instant convert!

As for anthropomorphism, it is a useful ploy in writing. After all, a cockroach can say things that a human might never dare to...
Date Added: 09/12/2005

Victor
Well then, all I have to say is that she seemed to have a good eye for literature, which she seemed to have passed to you.

Looking forward to reading your next post.

Vic
Date Added: 09/12/2005

Gone Away
My mother's taste in reading was eclectic, to say the least. In later life she concentrated upon crime literature which I found somewhat morbid (it did mean that I read Truman Capote's In Cold Blood which is probably the best of the genre, however). But she must have read far more widely in her youth, judging from the extensive library I sampled as a child. Thinking back, I would not have had it any other way for I read everything from the classics to cheap pulp fiction, thereby gaining a fair overview of literature in all its diversity. I owe the old gal more than I realized at the time.
Date Added: 09/12/2005

Victor
The things our parents give us, sometimes, are more precious than the materialistic gifts so many value. Reading and the appreciation of literature is one such gift. I wish I could say that reading is something a lot of parents stress to their kids today, but i'm afraid it is the exception now, rather than the norm. My parents never really did this for me, but they were always supportive (and still are) of the things I do. I learned to love literature during my early years, after my inability to blend in with the various cliques in school. I realized it was such a great escape when life got a little "annoying", and is still so, to this day.

Vic
Date Added: 09/12/2005

Twelvebirds
I had never heard of Archy before, either. He's delightful. The last poem you link, Pete the Parrot and Shakespeare, is absolutely brilliant. Thanks for introducing Archy. I enjoyed his writing very much. Archy is a very smart little cockroach.

I didn't realize chameleons had such a hard time writing. You make it appear effortless.
Date Added: 10/12/2005

Gone Away
All part of a chameleon's camouflage, to make the writing seem effortless, Twelve. ;) And I'm glad you enjoyed Archy; he was once an American institution but seems to have faded from view over the last thirty years or so.
Date Added: 10/12/2005

Scot
Clive, I'm not familiar with Archy and Mehitabel, and I'm curious as to whether they knew Gregor Samsa, who also had a curious metamorphic experience. Writing is something writers don't necessarily do out of want, but do out of need. Thus, what I find curious not only in Archy’s tale, but in Samsa’s as well, is the sense of isolation and failure, almost as if it were symbolically expressive of the act of writing itself. Scot
Date Added: 11/12/2005

Gone Away
Interesting thought, Scot - I had not considered the posibility of a connection between Archy and Kafka's Metamorphosis of Gregor Samsa. Metamorphosis was written in 1915 but Kafka was not published until after his death in 1924. Archy first appeared on the scene in 1916 so it is almost impossible that one influenced the other but interesting, too, that two writers so widely separated by geography would have been thinking about cockroaches at the same time.

Certainly, both Archy and Gregor felt the loss of communication upon their transformation and I think this is inevitable where writers are concerned. Their whole business is to communicate with others. So it would seem that both Don Marquis and Kafka used the idea in similar ways, as a vehicle for their thoughts. The big difference is that Archy succeeded in communicating, of course, whereas Gregor never did. Do I detect a different approach to the problem between the optimistic American and the gloomy German-speaking Czech?
Date Added: 11/12/2005

Scot
Clive, "The big difference is that Archy succeeded in communicating, of course, whereas Gregor never did. Do I detect a different approach to the problem between the optimistic American and the gloomy German-speaking Czech?" Good distinction. Thanks for that.
Date Added: 11/12/2005

Boogie
"No seriously, stop laughing, my Dad IS a chameleon!"
Date Added: 12/12/2005

Gone Away
And Boogie should know! :D
Date Added: 12/12/2005

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